How Spanky Taylor helped John Travolta get on Welcome Back, Kotter

JOHN Travolta appears in a section of Lawrence Wright’s book on Scientology:

Before Tom Cruise, John Travolta was the biggest celebrity Scientologist, joining during the mid-’70s when he was on the cusp of fame. The Church assigned Sylvia “Spanky” Taylor, a young, vivacious Sea Org member, as his liaison…

Travolta began taking the Hubbard Qualified Scientologist Course at the Celebrity Centre with about 150 other students. He confided to the teacher, Sandy Kent, that he was about to audition for a television show, Welcome Back, Kotter. Kent instructed everyone to point in the direction of ABC Studios and telepathically communicate the instruction: “We want John Travolta for the part.” At the next meeting, Travolta revealed he had gotten the role of Vinnie Barbarino — the part that would soon make him famous. “My career immediately took off,” Travolta boasted in a Church publication. “Scientology put me in the big time.

Five years ago I lost my cool, to say the least, during an interview with the Church’s senior spokesman Tommy Davis in a BBC Panorama called “Scientology & Me”. I apologised then and I apologise now for that tirade, and the footage of which went viral around the world. But in the intervening five years I have remained gravely troubled by the power of the Scientologist Church to intimidate critics and to maintain a hold over its adepts which some say is a kind of mental enslavement. The Church, for its part, says that I am a psychopath – one Scientology blog says: “John Sweeney is genuinely evil.”

Five years on from my very public meltdown, I’ve written a book, called The Church of Fear: Inside the Weird World of Scientology…

Take it away, John:

Photo: “PA NEWS PHOTO 31/8/68 STUDENTS OF THE SCIENTOLOGY CULT DURING A CLASS SESSION AT THEIR HEADQUARTERS AT SAINT HILL MANOR, EAST GRINSTEAD, SUSSEX.” Date: 31/08/1968